The Great Candle Disaster
by Lilly flower forever
Summary: In which Gabriel Agreste accidentaly orders too. many. candles. Day thirteen of the ML 2017 Christmas Countdown.


The Great Candle Disaster

 **Hello lovely people and welcome to day thirteen of my Christmas Countdown!**

 **I actually had no idea what to do for this prompt but once I started it just went in its own little direction so I hope you enjoy!**

 **Prompt: candles.**

 **...**

It started with one candle. Gabriel Agreste had just wanted one candle to put on the desk in his office to brighten up the atmosphere. It was almost Christmas and he wanted a bit of a Christmassy smelling candle. His wife had always loved to burn the special Christmas scented candles around this time of year and Gabriel missed it terribly. It was always comforting to have a gentle flame flickering away, Christmas smells filling the air.

His office was much too dull. He needed to have a candle in there. One would do, just enough to make it feel a bit more homely, but not too much. He didn't want his office to feel too much like a home. His office was a place for work.

So he had ordered Nathalie to buy a Christmas candle, one of the nice ones.

But now that he had the candle sitting in front of him on his desk, he could tell that it was _all wrong._ It was a Christmas candle, yes, but it was in such _gaudy_ red and green packaging that he couldn't help but cringe. And the smell was not as inviting as he remembered it to be. Perhaps it was the wrong sort of candle?

He decided that Nathalie must have brought the wrong one. Perhaps she had seen that it advertised that it was a Christmas candle, and had seen the red and green and had simply assumed that is what he had wanted, without realising how much more _refined_ his taste was.

He sighed in frustration and waved it away. It was not the candle he was looking for.

...

By the end of the week, he had tried twenty different candles and they were all not what he wanted. He wouldn't necessarily call himself _picky_ , but he _did_ have certain standards. All the candles either smelt too overpowering or had hardly any smell at all. Some of them smelt nice but just looked plain UGLY and Gabriel Agreste would not tolerate ugly in his office.

He had started searching for candles for himself. It wasn't that he doubted Nathalie's ability to find good candles- she _had_ found some nice ones, if you didn't mind a slightly stronger smell- but Gabriel had a delicate nose and had to have the right sort of candle. Why couldn't he find the candles that his wife used to burn? He had liked those ones.

...

Finding the right candle wasn't an obsession, not really. Gabriel just wanted to have a warmer, friendlier air in his office and a nice Christmas smell would help with that. And the scent of Christmas would help inspire him on some of his harder days at work, he figured. All he needed was one candle.

He sighed again as he tossed yet another candle away. Another one he didn't like. It smelt entirely too _summery_. He didn't _want_ summery. He had been searching for over a week now and still hadn't found a candle he wanted to have in his office. Everyone was starting to feel stressed out about finding the perfect candle. Nathalie was scuttling everywhere trying to find different candles and picking up ones that Gabriel ordered. A few days ago she had brought back a spiced fig scented one and he had dismissed it straight away. It didn't have the right feel to it and it didn't even burn for long enough. He didn't want a candle that went out every few minutes.

...

 _One hundred, one hundred, one hundred._

Gabriel muttered to himself as he scoured another site. The hundredth candle on the list looked like it might be just what he was looking for. A nutmeg scented candle sounded very promising. But then again, the last candle sounded like it might smell nice but it had made him feel nauseous.

Nathalie entered just then. "Sir? How many boxes of the gingerbread and honey scented candles did you want to order?" She asked, as that particular brand of candle would only sell their candles in boxes.

"One hundred." He answered absently, scrolling down on the page.

Nathalie looked a bit alarmed but left without questioning his decision. He was Gabriel Agreste and he knew what he wanted. He was not to be doubted.

Gabriel continued browsing the latest candle website to see what else he could find.

...

A few days later, Gabriel Agreste found himself with over a hundred boxes of candles on his doorstep. Nathalie had ordered a few extra, just in case. He let out a long sigh, trying to calm himself down. It didn't work and he turned to his assistant with a strained look on his face. "Why," He began slowly. " _Why_ are there all these boxes of candles _here_?" He demanded.

A slightly panicked look came over her face. "Well, when I asked you a few days ago how many boxes of the candles you'd like you said one hundred so I got one hundred." She explained hastily.

He breathed in deeply through his nose and closed his eyes for a minute before opening them again. "Nathalie." He said slowly. "I did not want a hundred boxes of these," he gestured to all the boxes. "Candles."

Nathalie looked apologetic and Gabriel swept down the steps to open one of the boxes. He pulled out one of the candles, noting the name of it- _Épices Et Délices_. Pulling off the glass lid, he delicately sniffed the candle. He stopped in surprise then sniffed it again. "This... this one is nice." He commented appreciatively. It almost smelt just like the ones his wife used to burn at Christmas time. "Nathalie, get a match. We'll see if it burns well."

She nodded and hurried off to do as he asked. Gabriel set the candle down on a nearby table. If the candle was still good when the flame was flickering then he would be setting many of the candles up around the house. After all, there were many and it couldn't hurt to have the Christmas smell all around the house.

...

Adrien came home from school that afternoon to find dozens of candles scattered all around the house and a warm gingerbread smell in the air.

 **...**

 **Well there we have it! I actually researched Christmas candles so all the candle scents mentioned in this story are real ones.**

 **Christmas countdown question: Do you like Christmas candles? Why/why not? I personally like all sorts of candles and I love Christmas so both together is great.**


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